Glimmer: How Design Can Transform Your Life, Your Business, and Maybe Even the World [Hardcover]

Glimmer is another in a line of books that capitalize on the current popular pre-occupation with "design thinking". This is the equivalent of a corporate-self-help movement to help industry (the corporate world) try to think more like designers in order to breed innovation in the workplace (and advance careers). While it provides a modestly interesting overview of design and a handful of worthwhile insights, it is ultimately reductive and lacking in depth. The author clearly is out of his depth. This becomes obvious in his near gee-whiz attitude to design and designers.

This is not a book for designers. This is a book for people who really know very little about design, its history, and the process of design and who would like a somewhat entertaining "can do" read about design and designers. It is a history of some interesting projects and noted designers. It is positivist and optimistic - very "feel good". It will not present any new information to most experienced designers or design mavens. It may provide some interesting reading to those who are new to design.

The book summarizes and categorizes some of the basic thought methodologies of design. It also shows, through narrative examples, how some designers work and how they consistently engage certain modes of thinking.

These modes of thinking break down to the following:
1) questions precepts and assumption - really try to completely understand everything you can about your design "problem"
2) think "laterally" - this is jargon that really means think creatively about relationships, analogies, or parallel design examples
3) empathize - use empathy to understand the problem and how the end user is affected by the problem and a potential design solution
4) prototype and iterate - don't be afraid to fail, failure is a part of the iterative process of design and it can lead the designer to a better solution

These are all perfectly good ideas. They should be well known to any good experienced designer. They can be summarized in a short paragraph or blog post. Applying them well in a design process is much harder than it might seem. There's a lot more to being a designer that is just not covered well in this book.

The book compiles and summarizes exercises that have previously been published in other books and which are largely well known in the design industry. It provides frequent quotes and out-takes from books by Bruce Mau, and it pulls pages from IDEO's design exercise card decks.

The downside of this book is that it is simplistic and too wedded to the entertaining narrative to be useful beyond the neophyte level. Further there is a rambling disjointed quality to the book. Thoughts are begun but left incomplete as the author shifts focus. There's a lack of cohesive logic. It's more of a pastiche of events, quotes, and narratives with a lot of filler and fluff content.

The author bills the book as demystifying design. At this it just fails. Why? Because while it tells stories, it focuses heavily on design personalities. It spends much more time reinforcing the iconic design hero rather than getting into any real depth about design. It also recycles a lot of design industry jargon which seems intended to establish insider credibility but which again puts mystique around the design process. To my way of thinking this just continues the process of mystification of design and designers. It also never gets around to the hard work and important experience that designers use to guide their efforts and solutions. This book is really about cashing in on a popular concept and popularizing design. If that's what you want then this is a good book for you. However if you are not a designer and you want to get real insight into design process and thinking Glimmer will ultimately disappoint, leaving the reader with a series of superficial concepts and partially understandings. There's nothing in this book that the non-designer can take and usefully employ in the workplace or the real world, though if it encourages a few people to begin the long hard job of becoming a good designer then there's no harm. As a designer with a lot of experience this just seems like a fluffy journalistic endeavor with a hint of pop-philosophy thrown in. The book lacks real meat for the hungry designer or those seriously curious about design.

Background:

I was loaned a copy of this book for review. I am a designer and have been working in a variety of media and disciplines for the last 25 years. I hold a number of international design patents and my work has won numerous awards. I've worked in and managed creative teams in top design firms and agencies around the US. Over my career I've consulted with multinational corporations to solve some of their toughest problems and help them design their futures. I take design very seriously

Summary and Suggested Readings:

There are some really great books on design out there that would actually be useful for the experienced designer. Glimmer just isn't one of them. For those who are interested in really good books on design I would recommend the following list. I realize most of these are architectural, but they are relevant to all types of design. Design is a process common to a wide range of disciplines - not a single discipline. These books will really help challenge a good designer to be a better more thoughtful designer. Cradle to Cradle is the most accessible but is well written and smart. Leach and Delanda provide great philosophical and critical depth and are appropriate for design professionals and those who want to exercise their brain cells.

Cradle to Cradle: Remaking the Way We Make Things by Michael Braungart

Rethinking Architecture: A Reader in Cultural Theory by Neil Leach

A Thousand Years of Nonlinear History by Manuel Delanda

The Anaesthetics of Architecture by Neil Leach

And I thought "design" meant home furnishings or a snappy cereal box.

It turns out that design is--or should be- a fundamental approach to human endeavor. Berger asks us to take step back from our assumptions of how things are and how things can be. This is not a hyper-philosophical treatise; rather, it takes real world examples and analyzes how design can improve the lot of one life or many lives. The provocative examples range from the simplest water portage "systems" in the developing world to high-tech innovation. This fascinating examination encourages one to think of the interconnectedness of design in individual terms as well as the implications for society as a whole.

This book is a nice surprise. It takes this big question -- what is design? -- and answers it in a sweeping book written in a thoroughly entertaining and readable style. Berger pulls the reader into the subject with plenty of fascinating and compelling anecdotes and interviews with a wide-ranging group of design stars. Think Malcolm Gladwell writing about design and its many facets.

Glimmer explains designers' innovative approaches to taking on -- and solving -- such disparate problems as making a readable and useable prescription pill bottle, to getting a million teenagers to stop smoking, to accessing clean water to supply a small African village. Berger uses the design philosophy of Bruce Mau (to whom everything, including one's life, is a design project) to put in context the endless possibilities of what design can achieve, and on the way, improve our lives. This book presents a fascinating and hopeful look at design, and shows us how a "glimmer" could just maybe change the world.

(OH -- and the illustrations and graphics add a very nice touch.)

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